What does statesmanship appear like? It has been many years since we’ve seen it constantly on the highest ranges in Washington. Over the previous two years we’ve witnessed the Biden administration’s sanctimonious mishandling of its relationship with a historic ally, Saudi Arabia; its cavalier therapy of different Center Japanese mates; and its misconceived Summit for Democracy, which relegated de facto allies in favor of weak, anarchic states. Though the White Home has been furiously switching gears of late—totally on account of its want for allies in opposition to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine—its foreign-policy assumptions have been revealed as essentially unsound.
Standing in distinction to those misdeeds are the data of three nice Republican secretaries of state who shepherded American diplomacy through the center and late phases of the Chilly Struggle: Henry Kissinger, George Shultz and James Baker III. Their successes have been inextricable from their understanding of America as a nation-state, a worldview that put the wants of the U.S. above all else.
